Last spring, I came out to my parents as a thespian. They already suspected it, but it was still very hard for them. It took a while, but they have now pretty much come to terms with the idea of me going into theatre. I could barely contain my smile when my dad turned to me during the Junior meeting about the college process and said, "You're going to need to send in audition tapes too, right?"
My love of theatre has been engrained in me since I was little, and my parents are to blame. When I was young, my parents would say, "Make a happy face! Make a sad face! Make a confused face!" and I would happily oblige. When I was a toddler, I watched "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" literally every day for a substantial amount of time. When I was in elementary school, my parents took the mirror out of my room, stuck it in the attic, and I didn't get it back until middle school because I spent too much time in front if it. I wasn't being vain. Oh, no! I was simply using it to practice making faces and acting. However, they couldn't take the bathroom mirror away, so I still had the joy of doing toothpaste commercials there!
I am very involved in theatre, but what I really want to get into is film - however, there aren't many opportunities to do that in East-Central Illinois. Even though I haven't done much of film, I'm pretty sure that I will prefer it to theatre. The main reason being, that I could not (and cannot) stand doing the same thing night after night - I would go crazy and my performance would start feeling horribly rehearsed. I figured out that I wanted to do film when I was living in Ireland. (This sounds crazy, I know, but it's true and I can't explain why.) After every time I watched a (not completely crappy) movie, and never at any other time, I would feel sick to my stomach and I somehow knew that I wanted to go into film. I know it's really weird. Don't judge. Does anyone else love something this much? Is this normal? Should I be put in a mental hospital? Well, I should anyway, but...
I spend most of my time thinking about, helping with, or participating in the dramatic arts. They consume my thoughts. When I zone off in class, there is a 95% chance that I am either developing a plot, a character, a scene, or anything else related to film or theatre. It is nearly impossible for me to be bored because I can always think of new stories and develop them. The only way that I have survived fitness all these years is by thinking about all of this while I'm suffering the torturous and tragic loss of life-sustaining minerals and energy (a.k.a. running).
One of the reasons I love the dramatic arts so much (and want to participate) is the costumes. I especially love historical stuff about rich people because the costumes are so elaborate and glamorous. I also love the music, which is something important to me outside the realm of the dramatic arts. Often, when I hear a song, I will start thinking of a scene that goes with it. Sometimes the scene is from a pre-existing idea I have already had, and other times I make a new one up just for the song. I think it would be really to cool to be able to collaborate with an artist(s) on a film so that the soundtrack of the film is also their album. When I'm developing a film, I will create a playlist for that film on my Ipod, which reflects the mood of the film and usually incorporates some songs that I have envisioned as scenes. But, the main reason is because I love it. I love being onstage and turning into a different person (so to speak). I love the heightened emotion and sense of reality that comes with that. I love the sense of community created in rehearsals and backstage.
So, this is what I want to do with my life, even though it is such a hard business to "make it" in. I want to act in films, but would probably be perfectly happy directing. I'm glad to know that I have my parent's support in doing theatre, so now all I have to do it get them to accept that I'll be going into film. It'll be interesting to see where I go on this crazy journey that I have already started myself on. Wish me luck! ...Or "Break a leg" if the circumstances call for it.
Thursday, October 25, 2012
Thursday, October 11, 2012
Gurl! Hold Ma Weave!
I got my first haircut in about six months yesterday. This is big news because it's my first haircut since I shaved my head last spring. Like, completely bald. That hairless freak you saw wandering the corridors? Yeah, that was me. The first thing most people ask when I told them I shaved my hair off is "Why?" It's a valid question.
"Because I got my brown hair dyed blonde for a school show that I was in."
"Why didn't you just dye it back?"
"Well, the way they dyed it (doing highlights and whatnot) I couldn't have just dyed it back - it would've looked weird. So, I just decided to shave it."
"Are you going to keep it short?"
"Haha! ...
My decision to shave it all off was quite rash, really. I pondered how to solve the ever-worsening problem of my my dark roots for about a week. I thought about dyeing it, but that would've look odd. I thought about letting it grow out, but that would just look ridiculous. I thought about letting it grow out just enough so I could cut the blonde parts off and still have a pixie cut, but that would take to long. The only logical thing left to do was to shave it. So I did. I sat on a plastic lawn chair in our back yard in front of a mirror propped up against a tree as my dad took to my head with an electric razor and much glee. He had shaved his head bald before I was born, so he was really excited for me to follow in his footsteps.
For the first week, I went around with a mohawk. According to some people I looked like "Puck" from "Glee," according to others I was a skinhead.
Then, for the next few weeks, I was completely bald. It was funny, when I went shopping or to a restaurant or wherever, because I could tell that people were treating me more nicely. People at the cash registers were more friendly, people gave me a sad/pitying smile when I passed them, etc. I'm pretty sure they thought I was a cancer patient. In fact, I was later told that some Uni parents asked their kids' if I was!
When my hair started to grow back, people's reactions changed drastically. One time, I was sitting in DCL and two girls and their mum walked by. One girl said, "Mom? Why doesn't that girl have any hair?" "Don't be rude!" hushed her Mum. Another time, I was in Target when a mother and her kids passed by. "Is that a boy or a girl?" asked one of the kids. Again, the automatic reaction on the mum's part was to quiet the kids and hurry away. Both times, I just laughed! I'm pretty sure I got glares from a few people who were disapproving of my unorthodox hair, though, and that was not appreciated. However, it made me wonder why people are so ashamed and disgruntled about non-ordinary hair. Seriously, who cares? If I want to go around looking like a freak, it's my problem. If you don't like it, don't look at me! Admittedly, it does bother me when I can't clearly tell someone's gender, since it makes things awkward. However, it's not like I was going around trying to be androgynous - in fact, I made sure to wear dresses/skirts (with shorts underneath) whenever I went out in public. And as for parents being so ashamed of their kids... They're kids! They don't understand social rules! They say whatever they're thinking! That's why they're so awesome! Why do we keep trying to break this habit out of them? We are teaching them to stay bottled up and closed off from the world! Let them be free! Fly, little kiddies! FLY! Anyway...
I experienced this lack of inhibition every week this summer. I worked at a camp for two months, and every week we'd get a new shipment of kids. That meant that every week I had (got?) to hear, "Y'know, when I first saw you I thought you were a boy!" At first, I laughed it off. But after a month it got old. Really old. Then again, that meant that every week I got to mess with a new set of campers and tell them things like: "Yeah, I was hiking in Maine and this bear came out of nowhere and started attacking me. Before I got away it slashed my head and they had to stitch it back up so I had to shave it." or "I jumped off a high dive and the water pressure when I hit the pool was so high that it ripped all my hair out." or "My dog ate it."
By the time I got back to school in the fall, my hair had pretty much grown into a pixie cut. The weird looks stopped coming, as did the comments questioning my gender. However, one thing was still the same as when I first was bald; my friends kept touching my head and playing with my hair. There was one lunch period where I had three people sitting around me, stroking my head, for 10 minutes.
I can't really figure out how to end this, so I'll just say this: friends are awesome because even if you look like the biggest freak in the world, they will still hang out with you because they love (creepily, at times) touching your head.
"Because I got my brown hair dyed blonde for a school show that I was in."
"Why didn't you just dye it back?"
"Well, the way they dyed it (doing highlights and whatnot) I couldn't have just dyed it back - it would've looked weird. So, I just decided to shave it."
"Are you going to keep it short?"
"Haha! ...
My decision to shave it all off was quite rash, really. I pondered how to solve the ever-worsening problem of my my dark roots for about a week. I thought about dyeing it, but that would've look odd. I thought about letting it grow out, but that would just look ridiculous. I thought about letting it grow out just enough so I could cut the blonde parts off and still have a pixie cut, but that would take to long. The only logical thing left to do was to shave it. So I did. I sat on a plastic lawn chair in our back yard in front of a mirror propped up against a tree as my dad took to my head with an electric razor and much glee. He had shaved his head bald before I was born, so he was really excited for me to follow in his footsteps.
For the first week, I went around with a mohawk. According to some people I looked like "Puck" from "Glee," according to others I was a skinhead.
Then, for the next few weeks, I was completely bald. It was funny, when I went shopping or to a restaurant or wherever, because I could tell that people were treating me more nicely. People at the cash registers were more friendly, people gave me a sad/pitying smile when I passed them, etc. I'm pretty sure they thought I was a cancer patient. In fact, I was later told that some Uni parents asked their kids' if I was!
When my hair started to grow back, people's reactions changed drastically. One time, I was sitting in DCL and two girls and their mum walked by. One girl said, "Mom? Why doesn't that girl have any hair?" "Don't be rude!" hushed her Mum. Another time, I was in Target when a mother and her kids passed by. "Is that a boy or a girl?" asked one of the kids. Again, the automatic reaction on the mum's part was to quiet the kids and hurry away. Both times, I just laughed! I'm pretty sure I got glares from a few people who were disapproving of my unorthodox hair, though, and that was not appreciated. However, it made me wonder why people are so ashamed and disgruntled about non-ordinary hair. Seriously, who cares? If I want to go around looking like a freak, it's my problem. If you don't like it, don't look at me! Admittedly, it does bother me when I can't clearly tell someone's gender, since it makes things awkward. However, it's not like I was going around trying to be androgynous - in fact, I made sure to wear dresses/skirts (with shorts underneath) whenever I went out in public. And as for parents being so ashamed of their kids... They're kids! They don't understand social rules! They say whatever they're thinking! That's why they're so awesome! Why do we keep trying to break this habit out of them? We are teaching them to stay bottled up and closed off from the world! Let them be free! Fly, little kiddies! FLY! Anyway...
I experienced this lack of inhibition every week this summer. I worked at a camp for two months, and every week we'd get a new shipment of kids. That meant that every week I had (got?) to hear, "Y'know, when I first saw you I thought you were a boy!" At first, I laughed it off. But after a month it got old. Really old. Then again, that meant that every week I got to mess with a new set of campers and tell them things like: "Yeah, I was hiking in Maine and this bear came out of nowhere and started attacking me. Before I got away it slashed my head and they had to stitch it back up so I had to shave it." or "I jumped off a high dive and the water pressure when I hit the pool was so high that it ripped all my hair out." or "My dog ate it."
By the time I got back to school in the fall, my hair had pretty much grown into a pixie cut. The weird looks stopped coming, as did the comments questioning my gender. However, one thing was still the same as when I first was bald; my friends kept touching my head and playing with my hair. There was one lunch period where I had three people sitting around me, stroking my head, for 10 minutes.
I can't really figure out how to end this, so I'll just say this: friends are awesome because even if you look like the biggest freak in the world, they will still hang out with you because they love (creepily, at times) touching your head.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)